Incline X Caeli - a Puzzle/Arcade/Visual Novel Amalgam - Early Access Launched

[D!!]

I was somewhat sceptical about the whole thing until the moment I tried it yesterday by myself. It's fun, it really is. If VN part will be as good as combat, than probably sales will be good even among casuals, because it looks like fresh and interesting mix on the indie market. Good luck to you and your team. I will be looking forward to the release.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Man I'll buy it at some point. If not this month then Jan for sure.

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

Gonna get this one just to check it out, but not right now (too much shit to take care of). Maybe in a week or so.

 

[Pope Amole II]

Gonna get this one just to check it out, but not right now (too much shit to take care of). Maybe in a week or so.

We'll be releasing a combat demo around this weekend, probably. Wanted to do it yesterday, but the steam may work in mysterious ways. It should give everyone a clear idea on how good the combat is (as long as they bother to try it out and to persevere past first few dozens of deaths).

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

Gonna get this one just to check it out, but not right now (too much shit to take care of). Maybe in a week or so.

We'll be releasing a combat demo around this weekend, probably. Wanted to do it yesterday, but the steam may work in mysterious ways. It should give everyone a clear idea on how good the combat is (as long as they bother to try it out and to persevere past first few dozens of deaths).

I just hope the VN parts are skippable.

 

[Pope Amole II]

I just hope the VN parts are skippable.

We have a pure skirmish mode.

 

[Pope Amole II]

Finally, the combat demo is up. Just go here and, well, use "download the demo".

It's just 5 fixed combat waves with 5 fixed sets of equipment to dispatch them (each wave should have at least a couple of possible solutions, if not more). There's gonna be lots of dying initially but that's how it should be.

 

[Mastermind]

I was somewhat sceptical about the whole thing until the moment I tried it yesterday by myself. It's fun, it really is. If VN part will be as good as combat, than probably sales will be good even among casuals, because it looks like fresh and interesting mix on the indie market. Good luck to you and your team. I will be looking forward to the release.

not to blackpill but shmup gameplay doesn't sell. it's the main reason why you don't see a huge storm of indie hustlers looking to cash in because otherwise they're easier to make than just about any other action game. hope the vn part has lots of anime porn

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

Apparently there's some juicy drama among Russian speakers related to this project and Pope Amole's YouTube channel.
Relevant link: http://steamcommunity.com/id/URLprofile/recommended/708970/#developer_response

Dis gon b gud. Not Grimwah thread good, but still good.

 

[Pope Amole II]

In other news, we've released a 0.7 update which is freaking huge and which should be making our game rather playable.

Trailers are still outdated (gotta hire someone to do them; I suck at that stuff) but you can look at the screenies - it's kinda same shit but prettier and easier to learn, etc.

Demo is also outdated (will arrive on the next week, probably) so I guess I'll just do this:

Spoiler

Y0Q7M-KBCCL-TIHXR

I'll post more keys but don't wanna be throwing them out in bulk 'cause someone will just hoard them all.

 

[Pope Amole II]

We've had another update today and the biggest part of that is our new public demo - now featuring all the improvements we've done over the last half a year and being solid enough. It's a steam demo so it's available there. We're also planning to start a small personal shop for our projects so a DRM-free and no-string attached version of demo (and game, obviously) will eventually appear there.

Spoiler

And there are many kinds of demos, ofc.
GZ4LT-2WKP5-TKW62

 

[Pope Amole II]

I'm going to post 5 keys here eventually so this is the third man:

Spoiler

YLBRI-WK2Y6-TKWZH

 

[Haba]

Key snatched! God damn it. At least have the decency to gloat once you ninja it.

 

[Pope Amole II]

Finally got to making a new trailer. It looks scrappy but I'm not a professional editor and we'll probably order a better one for the full release - this one is for the summer steam sale mostly.

And it's too early to order that one because we're still not fully done with the game - right now we're in the process of implementing a roguelite mode. You know, with the map, resources, some upgrades & stuff. Not something that I was planning initially but it should be done. I've playtested this one for hundreds of hours and I've found the gameplay to be good enough and rather surprising in a sort of emerging way. Only it's less emerging story and more emerging gameplay gameplay when the system is complex enough to create something entirely unpredictable before you.

So the combat is good but, apparently, our presentation of it is either meh or way too alienating. Thus, what can we do, we'll pack it into more convenient and acceptable shape. I won't even be innovating much here - it will be rather traditional. We've already done part of the work and we'll probably finish somewhere around early august.

In the meanwhile, I've polished the current playmodes a little. Now the Skirmish features endless challenge - after every wave the enemies are getting stronger and after every 5 victories you're getting +1 to the stat of your choice. Your victories and attempts at them are being tallied. It's just a challenge - how far can you go and how much you will suffer for it?

I've also implemented a veteran-only Warp Nine mode. Well, it's unlocked from the start but you won't get a single clue about it if you're new to the game. The idea is that you're going straight into combat without assembling your ship - you're given some random equipment. You're not even told what that is so you'll have to learn that by practice. You're given +1 to all stats to compensate for this but that's all. And you're fighting nine random waves in a row this way, each time with freshly warped equipment. All in an ironman fashion. It's chaotic, fun and somewhat ridiculous. Maybe a bit too difficult but that's not really a bad thing.

Spoiler

EJNEB-8TIHE-FEXXF

 

[Pope Amole II]

Through this spring, I've commissioned a bunch of Caeli art - not for the game but just to test certain peculiar artists and out of sheer fun. Also so our artwork section in steam is actually full. The best one, in my opinion, is the jumprope one - I've even ordered some Underrail stuff from that artist but that'll come in due time.

In other news, I'm currently looking for some beta-testers. Just PM me and I'll provide you with a key if you're interested. I don't want that much of your time, 10-20 hours overall over a course of 2 months will do. We're implementing a roguelite mode during this month and I'm having some challenge in understanding the actual difficulty of some waves - to me they're all manageable but, well, duh.

Keep in mind that the overall pace of the game (newcoming player gets repeatedly slaughtered for an hour or two until he gets it) is there to stay.

 

[Pope Amole II]

With todays update, our roguelite mode is up. Which should probably add more structure to the game and increase the overall playability and replayability.

Spoiler

EJNEB-8TIHE-FEXXF

 

[Pope Amole II]

First (and quite buggy) glimpse into our second game project - a tactic/roguelite hybrid high-T parody of W40k.

Spoiler

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Dat logo.